“The Arvoredo Marine Biological Reserve (RBMA) is a protected area in southern Brazil created in 1990 to safeguard the marine biodiversity of the Arvoredo Archipelago. There are only few studies about bird assemblage in most of the Brazilian coastal islands, including this protected area. Therefore, this paper presents the first complete list of birds for RBMA based on data from literature and surveys between 1986 and 2012 on islands and surrounding waters. Birds were recorded during captures using mist-nets and opportunistic observations on land in January 2012, as well as in monthly strip-transects and sectors on sea between 2010 and 2012.

The present list includes 84 species (15 captured) from primary data and 22 species from other sources, totaling 106 species from 37 families. Bird assemblage in the RBMA is composed by 44 aquatic birds and 62 landbirds, whereas 13 are endemic to the Atlantic Forest and 12 are threatened.

As expected due to the diversity of habitats, Arvoredo and Galé Islands supported the richest assemblages in the RBMA. The number of species in the whole RBMA is smaller than bigger islands elsewhere in the Atlantic Forest domain, but similar to same-sized and same-habitat ones.

Our results highlight the importance of this reserve as a suitable and isolated habitat to forest species. Deserta Island is an important site for nesting, resting, and foraging seabirds.”

Gaps in our knowledge of the geographical distribution of species represent a fundamental challenge to biogeographers and conservation biologists alike, and are particularly pervasive in the tropics.

Here we highlight the case of the Rufous-thighed Kite Harpagus diodon, a South American raptor commonly mapped as resident across half the continent. Recent observations at migration watch points have indicated it may be partially migratory in the southernmost parts of its range. To investigate this possibility, we collated contemporary and historical specimen records, published sight records and ‘digital vouchers’ – photographs and sound-recordings archived online (from citizen science initiatives) – and explored the spatiotemporal distribution of records. We were unable to trace any documented records of this species from Amazonia during the austral summer (October–March), or records from the Atlantic Forest biome during the peak of the Austral winter (June–August), and all proven breeding records stem from the Atlantic Forest region.

We compared this pattern with that of a ‘control’ species, the congeneric Double-toothed Kite H. bidentatus, again using specimens and digital vouchers. For this species we found no evidence of seasonality between biomes and can disregard spatiotemporal variation in observer effort as a cause of seasonal biases. We consider that all populations of Rufous-thighed Kites are fully migratory, wintering in Equatorial forests in the Amazonian basin. We provide evidence that this pattern was previously obscured by erroneous undocumented records and poor or erroneous specimen metadata, and its discovery was primarily facilitated by digital vouchers.

This discovery requires a reassessment of the species’ global conservation status as an Atlantic Forest breeding endemic, threatened by habitat loss and degradation, as it was previously considered to be resident across large swathes of undisturbed Amazonian Forest on the Guiana Shield. The bulk of the digital voucher data used to elucidate this pattern were extracted from a Brazilian citizen science initiative WikiAves, which may serve as a model for collating biodiversity data in megadiverse countries and help catalyse environmental awareness.

Salgado was born in a ranching family. His father wanted him to study law. He did not like that, and switched to studying economics. After a few years of work as an economist, he decided that he really wanted to be a photographer.

The deaths, and more deaths, became too much for Salgado. How could he continue to make photographs? His father’s ranch provided the answer. When Sebastião had been a child, large parts of it were Atlantic forest. Water, birds, and other animals everywhere.

Now, decades later, erosion had destroyed much. Sebastião’s father deplored the erosion, but did not know what to do against it. Then, Sebastião’s wife inspired her husband to start re-planting many Atlantic forest trees in the soil which had dried out.

The ranch became Instituto Terra; now a national park. Over a million new trees were planted. Water springs returned. Birds returned. Even jaguars returned.

This 2012 video says about itself:

Instituto Terra is a civil non-profit organization, founded in 1998 by Mrs. Lélia Deluiz Wanick Salgado and Mr. Sebastião Salgado, headquartered at the Bulcão Farm, in Aimorés, State of Minas Gerais, in Brazil, that intends to promote, facilitate and support programs and activities of fostering ecologically sustainable development by recovering, conserving, and correctly using natural resources. Following this purpose, Instituto Terra has been operating in four areas: environmental recovery, environmental education, nursery, and the encouragement of sustainable rural development.

The success of Instituto Terra inspired Salgado to photograph again. This time, many landscape and wildlife photographs. Eg, the film shows him making walrus photographs on Wrangel island in Arctic Siberia.

(Washington, D.C., December 15, 2014) The first-ever bird reserves have been created for the critically endangered Araripe Manakin, a six-inch bird only discovered in 1996 that numbers fewer than 800 individuals and survives in the smallest of areas – 11 square miles – in northeastern Brazil.

The reserves were made possible by the purchase of one parcel of land encompassing 140 acres and through a formal agreement with a neighboring landowner, who designated 27 acres of his land as a fully protected area. Both actions were carried out by Aquasis, a Brazilian conservation organization that has led the effort to protect the species, and through support from American Bird Conservancy (ABC), an organization that leads bird conservation efforts across the Americas.

“The Araripe Manakin exists only in a narrow strip of humid forest on the slopes of the Araripe Plateau,” said Dr. Daniel Lebbin, Director of ABC’s International Programs. “Creating this reserve is a critically important step in what must be a long-term effort to protect this bird’s habitat and prevent its extinction.”

“After 10 years of mapping the remaining habitat of the Araripe Manakin, we were confident enough to select properties that have all the desired features for this type of reserve: permanent springs and streams with prime nesting territories; good quality moist forest habitat; and good neighbors with excellent connectivity potential,” said Alberto Campos, Director of Aquasis.

The Araripe Manakin’s habitat is subject to continuing pressure from agriculture and the development of recreational facilities, so having “good neighbors” is critical to the species’ survival. The 140-acre reserve, referred to as the Sítio Lopes property, borders the Araripe National Forest to the south and includes a house that may one day be converted to a tourist lodge. This property is also connected by a vegetated river valley with the Sítio Fundão State Park, a 230-acre fully protected area managed by the state government. The 27-acre parcel located to the south is now a type of private reserve that is formally recognized as fully protected for perpetuity.

A joint reforestation project between Aquasis and ABC led to this acquisition. That project resulted in the planting of 4,652 seedlings of various native species within the project area, with more planned.

The Araripe Plateau is located in the heart of the vast, semi-arid and drought-strickened area that dominates most of the landscape of northeastern Brazil. The area features a massive plateau that spans the boundary of the states of Ceará and Pernambuco and is dominated by a unique ecosystem that includes a mix of Amazonian and Atlantic Forest habitats.

The numerous small rivers that transect the parched and distinctive desert vegetation in Ceará spring from a handful of mountains and high plateaus that draw moisture from the passing clouds. In addition to serving as the principal sources of water for millions of people living in this region, these unique mountainous areas harbor many relict species, including the Araripe Manakin. The area has been naturally isolated for millennia in what are essentially humid forest fragments of the tropical forest habitats that once dominated the region.

The Araripe Manakin prefers the lower and middle strata of the forest. It is dependent on forest streams with vegetation and feeds on a variety of fruit species found in the dense understory. The species shares its habitat with other Brazilian species found nowhere else, such as the Silvery-cheeked Antshrike, the White-browed Antpitta, and the Caatinga Antshrike. Just above their habitat is a plateau that collects rainfall and is home to an additional 100+ species, including the endemic Planalto Slaty-Antshrike and the Ceará Leaftosser.

“Dianne Feinstein wants to get this off her desk,” she argued, pointing out that the Californian Senator would no longer be Chairwoman of the Committee come January, and that the Democrats were likely using the torture report for political reasons.

“The United States of America is awesome,” she continued. “We are awesome. But we’ve had this discussion. We’ve closed the book on it. The reason they want the discussion is not to show how awesome we are. It’s to show us how we’re not awesome. They apologized for something.” The Young Turks hosts John Iadarola (TYT University), Steve Oh and Jimmy Dore (The Jimmy Dore Show) break it down.

Rupert Murdoch is not horrified by torture either. His employees defend torture at Fox News and in other parts of Rupert’s empire. As we have seen in the first video of this blog post. And as we shall see now in the second video.

This video from the USA says about itself:

Megyn Kelly Freaks On Torture But Her Guest Totally Surprises

9 December2014

“The Senate Intelligence Committee is putting out a report tomorrow on the CIA usage of torture techniques under the Bush administration. There is some security concern over the report going public, which is why thousands of U.S. Marines all over the world have been put on alert and the CIA has bolstered security for people worried the report’s release might make them a target.

Judge Andrew Napolitano argues that yes, they should, because “the American people have a right to know what’s been done in their name, especially when they’re misled about it.” He also said it’s not the report that will endanger lives, it’s what the report will reveal people did. Kelly said, “I’m sure that’s gonna comfort the families of the dead analysts we’re gonna see.”” The Young Turks hosts Dave Rubin (The Rubin Report), Ben Mankiewicz and Jimmy Dore (The Jimmy Dore Show) break it down.

The executive summary of the Senate Intelligence Committee’s torture report sheds light on the manner in which the corporate media knowingly served as a conduit for the CIA to selectively and anonymously leak favorable reports on its interrogation program to the public. The Senate document also discloses that the media acceded to requests from CIA officials and Vice President Dick Cheney to withhold information about the program that was deemed unfavorable.

The report makes clear that the so-called “free press” in America functions as a propaganda arm of the state, with journalists serving as stenographers of official lies. Through the input of the CIA, the media sought to obscure the heinous character of the actions being carried out and condition public opinion to tolerate, if not support, so-called “enhanced interrogation” methods.

An entire section toward the end of the Senate report is devoted to the role of the media. It explains that the CIA’s Office of Public Affairs (OPA) fed information to journalists on the torture program while the program was still officially classified in order to undercut critics and project a more favorable image of the program to the public. When such classified information was published, the CIA did not press for criminal investigations, as the leaks had been approved by the agency itself.

Classified information on the torture regime was provided to journalist Ronald Kessler, who used the information in his book The CIA at War, published in 2003. The Senate report states that the CIA decided not to investigate this as a leak of classified information because “the book contained no first time disclosures,” and “OPA provided assistance with the book.”

Senior Deputy General Counsel for the CIA John Rizzo is quoted as saying that an investigation was not opened because the transfer of information to Kessler had been “blessed” by then-CIA Director George Tenet.

The CIA again provided Kessler with classified information in 2007 in an attempt to undercut FBI agents who had begun to openly criticize the intelligence agency’s torture program. Kessler provided a draft of his book, The Terrorist Watch, to the CIA for editing. The CIA’s director of public affairs, Mark Mansfield, suggested revisions that would make the book less favorable to the FBI and its agents’ criticisms of the CIA and “more balanced” in favor of the agency and its torture program.

The CIA also worked closely with Douglas Jehl, the current foreign editor of the Washington Post, who was then a deputy Washington bureau chief for the New York Times. The report details one instance in which classified information concerning the torture program was passed from the CIA to Jehl and published in the Times in 2005.

Concerns were subsequently raised by the House Committee on Intelligence about the publication of an article containing classified information related to the torture program. The CIA’s Counter Terrorism Center legal team replied that the information had been provided by the OPA and thus did not warrant an investigation.

Jehl once again turned to the CIA in December 2005 for assistance with a new story concerning the agency’s torture program. Jehl submitted a detailed outline of his proposed article to the agency, assured them that the article would reiterate that the “enhanced interrogation techniques” were effective, and that the program had been authorized by the White House and Department of Justice. That article was never published.

However, another New York Times reporter, David Johnston, contacted the CIA with a proposal for a story on the interrogation program the following year, and his article did appear in the Times.

The Senate report asserts that both Kessler’s book and Jehl’s published article from 2005 contained “inaccurate claims about the effectiveness of CIA interrogations” which were largely consistent with information being provided to Congress by the CIA.

The CIA sought to control the media and public perception of its interrogation program not only through selective leaks to journalists, but also by requesting that news outlets sit on information it did not want to reach the public.

The CIA as well as Vice President Cheney pressured the New York Times in November 2002 not to reveal the fact that terrorism suspect Abu Zubaydah was being held at the intelligence agency’s secret prison in Thailand. The CIA feared that if the information was released, the Thai government would not accept future detainees. The newspaper complied with the request and concealed these facts until March 2003, after the prison had been shut down and Zubaydah and other detainees had been transferred to other black sites.

Zubaydah was held at various CIA black sites for four-and-a-half years, until he was transferred in 2006 to the Guantanamo Bay detention facility, where he is still being held. While in US custody, he was waterboarded approximately 83 times and subjected to a host of other forms of torture, including sleep deprivation, confinement in a small coffin-like box, and being repeatedly slapped, hit and slammed against a wall. Zubaydah, who lost his left eye at some point while in the custody of the CIA, has yet to be charged with a crime after more than 12 years of detention.

The reports on Kessler, Jehl and Johnston are the just tip of the iceberg. They point to the integration of the mass media, including supposedly authoritative outlets such as the New York Times and the Washington Post, into the military-intelligence apparatus. Prominent and highly paid “journalists” on a routine basis voluntarily allow their articles to be vetted by CIA censors.

The American corporate media is an accessory to the immense crimes carried out and covered up by both the Bush and Obama administrations, aiding and abetting torture, abductions, targeted assassinations and other atrocities.

“President Barack Obama criticized the torture techniques exposed by a Senate report in an interview with Fusion host Jorge Ramos, but stopped short of directly blaming his predecessor, George W. Bush and his administration.

“The CIA cannot act alone,” Ramos said on Tuesday. “Is this the responsibility of President Bush? Did he betray American values?”

CIA torture report: British spy agencies discussed redactions. David Cameron says UK intelligence only discussed influencing the Senate report on the grounds of national security: here.

Now Britain accused of using evidence obtained by torture of Guantanamo inmate: here.

REVELATIONS in a damning report into CIA torture of detainees led to renewed calls yesterday for the release of the last British resident held in Guantanamo Bay. The fresh demand for Shaker Aamer’s release follows the publication of a report earlier this week by the US Senate intelligence committee which said that interrogations of terror suspects by the CIA were “far worse” than the agency had portrayed: here.

One day after the release of the US Senate Intelligence Committee’s report on CIA torture in Washington, the government of Brazil officially unveiled a nearly 2,000-page report detailing the political murders, torture and other crimes carried out during two decades of dictatorship that began with a US-backed military coup in 1964: here.

John Pilger: Why has so much journalism succumbed to propaganda? Why are censorship and distortion standard practice? Why is the BBC so often a mouthpiece of rapacious power? Why do the New York Times and the Washington Post deceive their readers? Here.

Holy Batfrog! Scientists have discovered a new tree frog species with a shrill, batlike call in the Brazilian Amazon.

“As soon as I heard its call, I knew it was a new species. I had never heard anything like it,” said Pedro Peloso, one of the frog’s discoverers and a postdoctoral fellow at Museu Paraense Emílio Goeldi, Brazil.

Peloso and colleagues found the 0.75-inch (19.4-millimeter) amphibian in 2009 as part of a biodiversity survey of Floresta Nacional de Pau-Rosa, a protected area in the state of Amazonas (map).

The male frogs also have an unusually large vocal sac, a nearly transparent piece of skin that inflates to produce its unique high-pitched chirping sound. Male tree frogs in general make loud calls to communicate with females in distant treetops, but the new species is the first known to sound like a bat.

Once the team had brought their treasure back to the lab, “we kept talking about the ‘bat frog,’ which led to us talking about being fans of Ozzy Osbourne and Black Sabbath,” Peloso said.

At a concert in 1981, Osbourne bit the head off a bat that a fan threw on the stage, although Osbourne later said he believed it was rubber. Peloso named his bat frog Dendropsophus ozzyi, and it’s described November 6 in the journal Zootaxa.